Tell him then, oh Gabriella! that I not only forgave, but blessed him with the heart of a woman and the spirit of a Christian.
"I had a dream, a strange, wild dream last night, which I am constrained to relate.

I am not superstitious, but its echo lingers in my soul.
"I dreamed that your father was exposed to some mysterious danger, that you alone could avert.

That I saw him plunging down into an awful abyss, lower and lower; and that he called on you, Gabriella, to save him, in a voice that might have rent the heavens; and then they seemed to open, and you appeared distant as a star, yet distinct and fair as an angel, slowly descending right over the yawning chasm.

You stretched out your arms towards him, and drew him upward as if by an invisible chain.

As he rose, the dark abyss was transformed to beds of roses, whose fragrance was so intensely sweet it waked me.